User:Acinonyx2/Hierarchy of Needs

We broke for food shortly thereafter. Blaze was off to find a place that would get him good quality meat without his needing to sneak into a pasture somewhere, Dave was off to his own home, Icestar was off to who knows where. Tobias was on his way to his kitchen.

"Do you want anything, Nikki?" He asked.

"Nah, I'm good," I lied. I was starving, but I doubted he had what I was hungriest for.

He shrugged and walked out his bedroom door, leaving me alone.

I uncrossed my legs and walked over to the window. I looked down and tilted my head. Perhaps my hunger could induce a change. Then it wouldn't be as odd if I went for my favorite meal.

"Come on, raven. You need food. Food or death ... food or death ..."

I could feel my bones grinding and rearranging as my heart rate sped up. Sweat poured down my face as I gritted my quickly melting teeth to distract from the pain. Feathers sprouted all over my body, a painful molt.

I heard footsteps outside the door. I had to speed it up.

"You need food ... You're going to die without food. Big Scary predator behind the door. Food!"

That was enough to push me to my raven morph. I shot out the window ...

And fell in a crumpled, panting heap on the ground.

I painfully flipped over and stretched out my wings. Not broken. That was good. My back ached, however and my foot was curled under. I picked at it for a moment. Only a sprain, at least that's what I hoped.

I lifted off again and flapped over the road. I stared down at the ground, hoping for signs of something I had seen a couple of days ago. Hopefully the road crews hadn't gotten to it. If so, I would have to travel to the dump and have to fight with other birds over what was originally my find.

I circled around, past the nice suburban street and headed to a slightly wooded area. There it was. That wonderful, large deer that someone had sacrificed, just for me.

I flared my wings and landed on the deer. It had, oddly enough, not been torn into by other animals.

"This isn't a good sign," my human mind said to my raven mind.

I ignored it. What did the human mind know about scavenging?

I picked at the deer and tried to pull back the skin. Too tough.

"Really?" I asked myself. "All I want is the heart. Maybe the liver."

I sighed and resigned myself to pecking at the eye and tongue. Something was a little off about them.

"I told you so," the human mind said.

I ignored it and continued to eat. It was only off because of how long it had been. I chastised myself for my earlier complaint. I should be thankful that these highly nutritious parts were left. Normally, after this amount of time, someone else would have -

WHAM!

I was knocked off of the deer with a sudden force. I looked up to see a flash of brown wings.

"Tobias? Is that you? That's not funny!" I cawed.

The assailant wheeled around and dove at me again.

Not Tobias. It was a Golden Eagle. Death from above.

I scrambled to my feet to try and fly away. How stupid! I wasn't even watching my back like I should have been.

I felt something grab my claws and whip me around. It had me. I twisted around and pecked at the feet in vain. Something about this eagle made me think it didn't know the proper kill technique. I might have a chance.

I drilled my beak into the eagle's thigh bone.

"SKREEE!"

I was dropped quickly. I whipped around and began to fly, as fast as I could, back to Tobias' house. I could only hope that the eagle would go back to its meal. I turned my head back to look. No eagle.

I slowed down my flight. I couldn't waste too much energy escaping him.

I knew I shouldn't have been so foolish as to think it was over. A black shadow grew over me.

I looked up to see the eagle in a nose dive. A cruel grin in his eyes.

"Yeah, you're a morph," I whispered. A Golden Eagle wouldn't keep pursuing, not if there was a whole deer back there.

In my other eye, I could see a large, spotted cat in the field below. Blaze!

I knew he was stalking a pronghorn or something, but I needed help.

I twisted from the eagle and let myself plummet to the earth. If I could at least get the eagle to see the giant cat, then maybe I could get him away from me.

I felt my eyes water as I plummeted down. It was taking too long.

I was perhaps four feet above Blaze when I felt the talons in my back. i let out a croak of pain and flapped vainly to get away. I watched with blurring vision as Blaze's head perked up and turned to me. I tried to let out a call for help, but all I could do was let out a raspy caw.

As my vision turned to red, I thought one thing.

"This is the only thing good about the human form. No golden eagles."